Day 2
Blake
After the 2nd day, I'm starting to see what the real challenges of this experiment are going to be. My first day went so well that I should have expected things to get a bit harder. I definitely have some stuff to figure out, but I'm confident it's something I can work through.
Here's the hardest part: My body thinks it's supposed to be asleep at night. I know that should seem obvious, but it's more intense than I expected. The two days I've had on the sleep plan have been awesome. I've been way more alert than I usually am, and have had no trouble staying awake. Even when I went to the film festival yesterday I felt great the whole time (I always fall asleep during movies).
The two nights I've been through have been really, really hard. I've had the same amount of sleep before both night and day, but the nights are when my body starts trying to shut itself down. I don't know if this is more of a physical or mental thing, but it's something I have to figure out. It could be my body releasing melatonin at it's normal time and trying to chemically shut me down. It could also be my brain realizing that it's night and treating sleep like a bad habit; like, it's wanting me to fall asleep, just because that's what I always do at night.
It's always way better when I'm active. I think I'm going to have to try more physically interactive ways to occupy my time. We started putting together this epic looking viking puzzle late last night, and that helped more than I expected it to. I still had the 4-5 o'clock attack of sleepiness.
The last little while before my morning nap is not productive at all. It's just spent wrestling with my brain, trying to convince it that it really doesn't need to fall asleep. Luckily, as soon as the sun hits the windows, I feel fine again. Any night owls who have good staying awake tips, I could use them right now.
Caitlin
I think we are starting to learn that the key to feeling well and alert during the awake period is to start off doing something active.
After our 12am nap today, we sat around for an hour or so watching a TV show and some TED talks. Blake seemed to have some trouble, and I was pretty sleepy myself. It didn't help that we were both very cold, and we didn't want to leave from under our covers.
Eventually we both got up and started to clean the kitchen (we left quite the mess after breakfast yesterday). It didn't take long for us to both wake up and feel alert like we did yesterday during our awake periods.
My 6am was not so successful. I went to bed, ready for the nap. My alarm failed (Scout was next to me, and she always wakes up to my alarms), so I ended up sleeping until around 8. I'm not really happy about this, since I told myself there would absolutely no oversleeping on my part. Oversleeping can very easily mess everything up. I basically sat around after that in the living room for another couple hours in a half concious state. Blake was recalling all kinds of conversations we had that I don't remember.
I'd like to report that I started to feel better after my noon nap, or even my 6pm nap, but no. I've pretty much felt like crap all day, and I think the 6am nap mishap had a lot to do with this. Also, I figured out the headache and extra sleepiness from yesterday was from monthly hormone changes. That might also factor into some of today's crappiness.
Today's sleepiness is a lot different than yesterday. Yesterday, I would get really sleepy, but after my nap (and a short groggy period), I felt pretty good; the naps, even the ones where I didn't sleep, were a little regenerative. Today, it seems like the naps aren't doing much besides satisying a little bit of desire for sleep. Doing activites aren't helping like they were yesterday, either.
I am having to struggle to keep hold on the little willpower I have left right now. It's so easy to sit down and just pass out. But then I remember that I'm actually probably supposed to be feeling like this right now.
i was expecting something like this... i reckon by day 4/5 things will start to pick up or get terrible (one of the extremes). i'm hoping for the picking up because this is good reading.
blake, if you can work at something you love to do, or play anything you love, on a computer, that might help you stay awake. computer screens apparently help you stay up:
http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/news/20030620/nighttime-computer-users-may-lose-sleep
which sounds like just what you need.
if you need ideas on anything to do, help my band win this competition by voting with any email addresses you can find:
http://www.emergingtalentawards.com/vote/band/acrylic-iqon
I hope the it picks up soon as well...
Certainly loud music, AC and lots of bright lights couldn't hurt.
Trick is to keep occupied, you can have a coffee when you wake up, tea is better. Eat salads and exercise every day if possible.
You will slowly gain weight regardless of the food and exercise, this is the bodies natural way since you're producing more cortisol.
Keep busy, have a project and lots of books.
Good luck, it's worth it!
I like the music and lights though. Definitely the lights. I think that would help me a lot.
Ryan - I think I'm going to take your advice on the tea. I could use something that gives me a boost every now and then. I'm trying to stay away from coffee for fear of the big spikes and crashes. Thanks for warning about the weight gain. I really hadn't considered that.
Just curious, what did you mean by reboot sleep?